Syst Pract Act Res (2007) 20:1–13 DOI 10.1007/s11213-006-9045-1 ENGAGED RESEARCH Involved in Praxis and Analytical at a Distance Morten Levin · Johan E. Ravn Published online: 26 January 2007 C  Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2007 Abstract Lately, society has pressed for more direct societal relevance of social research. The argument of this special issue is that engaged research is an answer to the demand for a social science that matters. We define engaged research as a praxis where researchers actively engage in a social field in the pursuit of solving important local problems, while at the same time combining this with a scientific knowledge generation process. In other words, we discuss the conditions for research when researchers “go native” to solve problems and reflect along with participants. We have been able to find several sources of arguments supporting such a research strategy, but our search for methodological guidance on how to act as an engaged researcher has been in vain. What does it take for a researcher to do engaged research? The set of articles in this special issue all address certain aspects of this challenge. Some discuss the researcher’s path towards deep field engagement, whereas others discover various challenges and skills involved in engagement, and the task of developing scientific knowledge based on engaged research. Keywords Social science . Involvement . Rigor . Relevance 1 Introduction Fieldwork is the cornerstone of empirical social science. The understanding is that the scientist, regardless of field, be it anthropology, psychology, or sociology, engages with local people in the “field” in order to generate data. The scientist’s engagement spans from detached M. Levin () The Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Trondheim, Norway e-mail: morten.levin@iot.ntnu.no J. E. Ravn SINTEF Technology and Society, Trondheim, Norway Springer